Far Eastern Air MD-83 Returns to Auction at Reduced Price
Far Eastern Air Transport MD-83 re-auction in Taiwan at TWD 4.1 million after zero bids, with over TWD 40 million in unpaid fees at Taipei Taoyuan Airport.
Jishan Khan 
Taiwan's Administrative Enforcement Agency will re-auction a grounded former Far Eastern Air Transport MD-83 on June 2, 2026, with the starting price slashed from TWD 8 million to TWD 4.1 million after the first attempt drew zero bids. The 28-year-old aircraft has sat at Taipei Taoyuan Airport since the airline collapsed in December 2019.
Six and a half years parked at a gate. The bill has been running the entire time.
The Jet That Nobody Claimed
The aircraft, registered B-28027, owes over TWD 40 million in parking fees and penalties at Taoyuan, more than nine times the current auction starting price. It no longer holds an airworthiness certificate, meaning whoever buys it is not getting a flyable aircraft. They are getting an aging airframe with no legal right to operate commercially, a mountain of debt attached to its history, and whatever value remains in its parts and materials.
That is a harder sell than it sounds, and the first auction proved it. A previous attempt set a TWD 8 million base price and received no bids at all. Cutting the price nearly in half is the authorities essentially asking the market what this jet is actually worth, rather than what they hoped it would be worth.
This Is Not the First FAT Aircraft Taiwan Has Had to Deal With
The Taoyuan MD-83 is not a one-off problem. A separate former Far Eastern Air Transport MD-83 at Taipei Songshan Airport was finally sold in January 2026 on its third auction attempt, going for just TWD 3.2 million, a fraction of what any working aircraft of that type would have fetched before the collapse. The pattern is consistent: first auction fails, price drops, eventually someone buys the metal.
Far Eastern Air Transport was founded in 1957 as Taiwan's first private airline, operating for over six decades before a cash crisis ended operations abruptly in December 2019. What is left behind are ageing jets, unpaid bills, and airport authorities trying to clear space that has been occupied for years without compensation.
The June 2 auction is essentially Taiwan asking one more time whether anyone wants what remains of a once-operational airline. At TWD 4.1 million, someone probably will.
